Peter O'Sullivan was once facing life imprisonment after beating a man to death. Now he raises money for charity and is training to become a Methodist preacher. Julia Breen tells his story.

ON the day of his birth in 1957, Peter O'Sullivan was pictured in the arms of a princess. At 13lbs 11oz, he broke the hospital's records for the heaviest baby and his birth coincided with the visit of Princess Alexandra, who was there to open the new maternity ward.

"You would think after that start in the world I was destined for great things," says Peter wryly. "But, in fact, that was the start of the downhill slope."

Brought up in Northamptonshire, Peter, now 46, was the son of two police officers. But at an early age he was brutalised by his father, who had been suffering from psychiactric problems after serving as a submariner in the Second World War.

Peter, along with his five brothers and sisters, was regularly beaten. Even his severely mentally handicapped sister didn't escape his father's brutality.

"I grew up harbouring this hatred inside me," he says. "I just believed that violence was a means to an end."

At nine years old, Peter was returning home from the shops when he was collared by a man posing as a policeman.

Peter's smile and his matter-of-fact manner leaves him as he describes the incident. "This person told me he was a police officer and he suspected I had stolen some sweets. He took me to this place and made me strip off all my clothes to search for the stolen sweets. Then he raped me.

"I didn't tell my mother and father even though I was bleeding and in extreme pain. I cleaned myself up before I went home and I felt intimidated, dirty and guilty - but I still couldn't tell them."

The vicious rape, coupled with his hatred for his father, led to a lifelong hatred of the police. He says: "It had a dramatic effect on me. A short time later I was arrested for trying to blow up a police car."

Peter later joined the Army and served in Cyprus and in Northern Ireland during the Troubles of the 1970s, but was discharged after being injured.

After leaving the Army, Peter admits he felt unsupported in the civilian world. A Tae Kwon Do brown belt and boxer, standing at 6ft 3ins, weighing over 16 stone, he felt a lack of purpose outside the Army.

'Within a short space of time I was up in court on a murder charge," he says. "It was a particularly nasty fight and the other guy died.

"What happened was that this other guy sexually assaulted me. I was doing a job for him as a favour and he obviously thought his friendship extended a bit further than it did. He made a move on me and I just saw red, I went OTT on him.

"I just remember him trying to sexually assault me and them all I remember was him lying on a heap on the floor."

Peter was cleared of murder but convicted of manslaughter and robbery, and sentenced to eight-and-a-half years in prison. He served five.

"I was in a top security prison in Worcestershire for a time but they used to move me around from prison to prison because I did no end of damage wherever I was," he says. "I assaulted prison officers, other prisoners. Basically, anyone who didn't agree with me got it. I thought I was really clever, that there was no one to match my intelligence.

"I had a hard time in Reading prison for about four months. Because I was an A category prisoner, they didn't like the fact they had to do extra work - to get me out of my cell it took four screws."

While he was doing time in Reading in 1981, Peter's father died of cancer. "I didn't cry, I didn't get upset, I had no emotions. It was just like watching someone else. He had brutalised me all my life. I don't remember him ever sitting me on his knee or saying a kind word."

After his release, Peter's violence and run of prison sentences continued. A sentence for robbery with violence followed, and then another for carrying firearms.

He served another prison sentence after he and a friend got a taxi home after a night out drinking. He says: "The taxi driver tried to charge me too much. I stuck £1.80 in his hand and said 'there, that is what it says on the meter'.

"Most people would have left it at that but I gave him a good hiding and stole all his money."

Another sentence followed, for GBH and malicious wounding after a fight in a pub. Then, after a fight with three men one night in 1996, he was surrounded by police officers, made to lie down on the floor, and arrested.

He was kept in custody for more than seven months while he waited for his trial for GBH. "They said I was an extremely violent and dangerous man and, for the safety of witnesses, I should be kept in custody," he says.

"I was taken to Holme House prison in Stockton. They have a wing there, House Block One, where every prisoner goes for two to three days maximum, but they kept me there for six weeks. "It was called the Black Hole of Calcutta.

"They had a VP, or vulnerable prisoner, in the cell with me. He was a really nice lad but, because he was nice, the other prisoners took advantage. He was a Christian and was getting letters from the Jesus Army. He couldn't read or write so I read the letters and wrote for him.

"One day he asked me to read a passage from the Bible. I read for an hour-and-a-half and, by the end of it, it was like a light had come on. By the time I finished reading, Jesus came into my life and my life has never been the same again."

The charges were later thrown out of court by a judge, who advised Peter to make a fresh start. He moved to Darlington and started going to church, where a Methodist minister helped him through the difficult patches.

He now raises money for charity - he is taking part in the Great North Run for Beaumont Hill School in Darlington later this year - and is training to be a preacher. Last year he even completed the Great North Run with broken ribs so he wouldn't let the school down.

He is married after years of being unable to commit to women because of the countless prison sentences, and is bringing up his stepchildren as his own.

He believes by telling his story, he can help change people's lives as he has changed his. "If I can stop one young lad turning out like me, then I will have achieved what I set out to do," he says.

"I am now totally non-aggressive. When someone makes me angry and I think about what I want to do to them, this calming influence comes over me and says 'you know I wouldn't like you to do that Peter'.

"I would never hurt anyone again, turn on anyone or put them down, even in my own mind. When I do, I get an awful surge of conscience.

"I have had grey hair from a very early age, which I never liked, but now I think of it as my crown of wisdom. I had years of stress and worry, of fighting and looking over my shoulder, worrying about the sound of police sirens.

"I have had some good times and bad times, but I truly believe the best time is now."